Bear blues: over $296 million in shorts liquidated in 24 hours

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The possibility of a spot Ethereum exchange-traded fund (ETF) approval in the US took the bears by surprise, resulting in over $296 million of short positions being liquidated in the past 24 hours, according to data aggregator Coinglass. Ethereum short positions liquidated represent $100 million of the total.

Meanwhile, long positions represent just $80 million of all derivatives liquidations in the last 24 hours. The total market cap of the crypto market leaped 8,1% in the same period, with Ethereum (ETH) leading the pack of major crypto by registering a 23.7% growth.

The market turned around yesterday after Bloomberg ETF analysts James Seyffart and Eric Balchunas boosted to 75% their odds of a spot Ethereum ETF approval in the US, outshining the previous 25%. 

Up until then, even large asset management firms’ executives didn’t believe in a positive scenario. This was reflected by crypto funds’ weekly flows, as Ethereum-related funds saw over $23 million in outflows last week amid ETF uncertainty, reported CoinShares.

However, the SEC started moving in the background, motivated by “political issues,” as highlighted by Balchunas. This could be related to last week’s Senate vote to overturn the regulator’s Staff Accounting Bulletin 121 (SAB 121), which made it costly for banks to offer services with crypto. As SAB 121 was confronted by the Senate, the SEC might be in a tight spot and could be avoiding lawmakers’ scrutiny.

Ready to fly

The trader identified as Rekt Capital shared on X that the altcoin market is ready for its Q2 hypercycle, after successfully holding the $250 billion market cap support. According to the trader, this next upward movement in the altcoin market might be maintained up until July.

$ALTS

Welcome to the Q2 Altcoin Hype Cycle

The Altcoin Bottoming Out process is in progress$BTC #Crypto #Bitcoin https://t.co/g5QUFID6jg pic.twitter.com/Xy3wiUL9yA

— Rekt Capital (@rektcapital) May 21, 2024

As for Bitcoin (BTC), a weekly close above $71,500 “would probably kickstart the breakout from the re-accumulation range,” highlighted Rekt Capital. Yet, previous cycles indicate that BTC has a significant chance…